Directions: This Launchpad, adapted from http://www.whatsoproudlywehail.org/, provides background materials and discussion questions to enhance your reading and understanding of Mark Twain’s short story “The Man That Corrupted Hadleyburg.” After reading the story, you can click on the videos to hear editors Amy A. Kass and Leon R. Kass converse with guest host David Brooks (New York Times) about the story. These videos are meant to raise additional questions and enhance discussion, not replace it.
Given Twain’s known penchant for irony, comedy, and satire, some readers have seen this story as a replay of the Garden of Eden story—recounting the Fall of Hadleyburg, the innocent or virtuous “city on a hill”—and see the source of its corruption—the “Man” of its title—as the incarnation of Satan. In fact, in his hilarious autobiography, Twain himself encourages such a reading. “I have always felt friendly toward Satan,” he confesses. He reports how, as a seven year old, he thought to write a biography of Satan, a project Mr. Barclay, his Sunday School teacher, nipped in the bud. But Twain often returned to this subject in stories such as “Letters to Satan,” “Sold to Satan,” “A Humane World for Satan,” “That Day in Eden,” and “The Mysterious Stranger.” Others, however, see this as a story about an already corrupt human nature, in which people merely reveal their lack of integrity just as soon as temptation is at hand or when countervailing forces are absent. Consider, in this regard, that the plot begins only after Barclay Goodson (“God’s son”) dies and that the sack of gold is placed in the hands of Edward Richards (“son of riches”). To figure out which view, if either, is most plausible, we need carefully to consider the evidence.
Hadleyburg and Hadleyburgians
a. Do they differ from the other townspeople? If so, how?
b. What happens to them at the end of the story, and why?
a. What is he like?
b. What does his fate tell us about the town?
a. Describe them. What distinguishes them?
b. Why do you think Twain (or the narrator) spares them his ridicule?
The story invites questions about a number of interesting themes important for thinking about the meaning of America: the virtues (real and apparent) of civic life; civic pride; the desire for gain and the commercial spirit; the strengths and weaknesses of religious belief; the power of public opinion, especially in democratic societies and democratic times; the treatment of strangers (and nonconformists); honesty, dishonesty, and hypocrisy; and the role of humor in the education of citizens. Here are a few worth your attention.
Virtue and Civic Pride
The Commercial Spirit and Religion
Individualism and Public Opinion
As Twain’s story makes evident, the rule of public opinion can easily lead to prideful pretentiousness and the tyranny of the majority.
Humor and Citizenship
Twain’s remedy for the foibles of America—or of America in the Gilded Age—seems to be laughter. He turns his biting wit against the commercial spirit, religion, and the narrowness and pretentiousness of small-town America—and we all laugh with him. But we should also consider the significance of (his) humor for civic life and its possible improvement.
The original book cover. Courtesy Wikimedia Commons.